


You Catch More Flies

by storiesfortravellers



Category: Dollhouse
Genre: Angst, F/M, Greek Mythology - Freeform, Penelope - Freeform, relationship
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-09-30
Updated: 2012-09-30
Packaged: 2017-11-15 08:16:31
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 317
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/525120
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/storiesfortravellers/pseuds/storiesfortravellers
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>One-shot about Paul's conflicted feelings about Mellie, and his fears that his devotion, since it brought him to the Dollhouse, may be his destruction. Paul compares Mellie to Penelope of Greek myth, and wonders what he's going to discover.</p>
            </blockquote>





	You Catch More Flies

**Author's Note:**

> This was originally written for comment_fic at livejournal
> 
> The prompt was Mellie/Paul, Penelopiad (for the day dedicated to prompts inspired by book titles)
> 
> The Penelopiad is a cool Margaret Atwood book that retells the story of the Odyssey from Penelope's point of view. This fic has SPOILERS for that book, so if you're planning to read the book, be aware of spoilers.

Mellie is his Penelope. Paul feels sure of this. After all, she is the one he fights giants for. The one he goes through hell for.

She waits for him, he knows. She bides her time, stalling desperately, until he arrives to save her from all her corrupt suitors. The ones who betray her, who see her as a means to an end, who want to use up all that she has for their own amusement. Like guests who feast on the host's herds without asking permission for the slaughter.

But he wonders sometimes if she knows more than she lets on. If she isn't weaving something grander and more terrifying than he can understand. There are little things that make him wonder.

Maybe she is not Penelope. Maybe she has lured him to the Dollhouse for some purposes not his own. Maybe she is a Siren, luring him to the rocks. Maybe she is Calypso, keeping him prisoner, making him forget the path that he should be following. Turning him into a man that would compromise, where once he would have fought.

Or maybe she is Penelope after all. But Penelope is not the innocent long-sufferer. Maybe Penelope is a stonecold mankiller. A sweet girl as the ultimate Trojan horse.

Penelope is a myth of course. But at one point, she was probably a real woman. But over the years she has been written and re-written so many times that she is no longer a woman. Instead, she is many women.

And since her story may be re-written at any time, she is, by definition, treacherous.

Maybe it's all the weaving that Penelope does that makes Paul so nervous when he remembers that story. Like what spiders do, creating a trap for flies.

The first time he met her, he loved her name. Mellie. Sounds almost like the 'mela,' he noticed. The Greek word for honey.


End file.
